The Last Line

Ask the last one what she is waiting for

on the beveled street behind the white horses

and hypnotists, and she’ll say

nothing as she taps the cudgel against her knee. 

One of the women far ahead in gold

earrings and folkloric dress looks like her sister, but

darker, finer.  Is there something beyond

the rise?  Silent, she wipes her bleary eyes,

shifts weight to her sodden foot tethered

to morning wind and the turbines begin:            

“The Last Line” first appeared in The Seattle Review.